Editorial: B.C. budget uncertainty shows the need for a fall vote

B.C. Finance Minister Mike de Jong revealed on Wednesday that the projected deficit for the current year is now $1.47 billion, or 50 per cent more than predicted when the budget was tabled in February.

Photograph by: Postmedia News
, timescolonist.com (May 2012)

Once again, British Columbians are going to be asked to trust the government’s budget promises when we go to the polls in May.

That hasn’t always turned out well, either with the current Liberal government or during the decade the New Democrats ruled the province.

We know that budgets can’t come with a guarantee. They are essentially plans that depend, in part, on factors outside of the control of government. But for years we have also known of a relatively simple way to give voters better information to judge the government’s ability to manage its own finances, a key issue in every election.

That solution — to move the fixed election date from the spring to the fall — was one of the suggestions made in a 2009 followup report by Douglas Enns, the distinguished accountant brought in by the NDP in the late 1990s to restore credibility to the budget process.

Credibility was an issue then because of a pre-election budget that an auditor general later criticized for being based on unjustifiable optimism about projected revenue.

In 2009, the pre-election budget introduced by the Liberals under then-premier Gordon Campbell predicted a deficit of $495 million. By the time the year played out, the audited financial statements showed that the Liberals missed that target by more than $1 billion.

While there may have been no attempt to mislead — the world economy was in the process of falling off a cliff — moving the election date would have given voters, and the government, a clearer picture of what was occurring. It might have helped avoid the HST debacle that followed.

This week, Finance Minister Mike de Jong revealed that the projected deficit for the current year is now $1.47 billion, or 50 per cent more than predicted when the budget was tabled in February. Despite those dismal numbers, he is sticking with his government’s commitment to bring in a balanced budget when the Legislature returns in February.

That budget will cover the coming year, from April 1, 2013 to March 31, 2014. When voters go to the polls in May, it will still be an untested promise.

The previous fiscal year will be over, but the audited results, known as the public accounts, won’t be released until the summer. Is the finance minister’s optimism in the face of a somewhat gloomy economic outlook for the coming year and disappointing revenues for the current year credible?

That question will be hotly debated during the months to come, a debate that will intensify when the official campaign starts in mid-April.

We will have more information along with the budget in February, which by tradition includes the results for the third quarter of the fiscal year.

We could have the same debate with less heat and more light if the election were held in the fall. The results for the previous year would be in. The election budget that was tabled in the spring would have been fully debated and enough time would have passed so that it would be at least partly tested.

We have made a lot of progress on reforming the budget process since the day in 1996 when former premier Glen Clark brought in a budget in the morning and hit the campaign trail in the afternoon. The NDP initiated many of the changes that made budgeting transparent. The Liberals brought in fixed election dates.

Both parties should support moving that date from the spring to the fall as another step toward transparency and more accountable government in this province.

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B.C. Finance Minister Mike de Jong revealed on Wednesday that the projected deficit for the current year is now $1.47 billion, or 50 per cent more than predicted when the budget was tabled in February.

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